Good news: I found the last (for the time being) leak in this XJ I need to fix.
Bad news: I have a rusted out silver dollar size hole in my passenger floorboard I've got to figure out how to patch.

I've been noticing that the carpet on the passenger's side gets damp sometimes, and today I decided to remove the front seat and pull back the carpet to take a look. There's like 2 gallons of water in there, and it smells terrible, like rotting eggs kinda. I can't believe the jeep doesn't stink as much as that water down there.

It really is awful. There are a few lightly rusted areas, but most of the floor is shiney white, especially in the worst places where the water collects in the jack storage area. I was really happy to see that.

The origin of the leak appears to be my AC, dripping back behind the glove box and down the firewall Right at the base where the firewall meets the floor meets the tranny hump that rusted out. It wasn't completely gone, but I was able to punch it out with a screw driver. Not sure if water was able to splash in through there, but I guess it's more likely than not that it would.

I'm debating on whether I should toss the carpet or not. It's a hideous piece on the bottom, but the top looks OK and it does a great job hiding the smell, so maybe letting it dry out for a couple of weeks would make it good-as-old.

I don't have a welding rig yet and I don't know anybody that does in order to patch the hole properly, any recommendations on a fix that will last a couple of months?

 

For a silver-dollar sized hole a piece of sheet metal (at least 22ga. preferably heavier) and rivets or epoxy (note: if you plan to repair it "properly" later you may want to avoid the epoxy option as it can be a real pain to remove) and seam sealer will do fine, especially if it is only temporary. Here up north where holes big enough that you can stick your hand through are common, a silver-dollar sized hole is considered a "minor" issue, this is well below the size where it is compromising the structure.

 

Yea I wish my floor only had silver sized hole in it. On my last jeep I replaced the floor on both sides with 16 GA sheet metal and welded it in. I tossed the nasty carpet and instead got myself a Herculiner roll on bedliner kit. I was very happy with the turn out.

 

Update:

Replaced fan clutch today. Definitely better flow when the engine is up to temp than with the one I had before, and pretty crazy flow when the RPMs go higher compared to the one I replaced. I'd guess 30-40% more air circulating, and with the engine at 210 and off, the fan was noticeably harder to turn. I'm anxious to see how the temperature behaves now when I'm loading the engine while stationary (e.g., stuck)

Also completed taking the carpet out.

There were more rust treasures for me. A pretty nasty one on the driver side right behind the pedals. Great position to replace with a welded in piece, but that piece will probably be 4"x8" or more. Should be super easy to weld that one, it's right in the middle of the wheel well. At the moment it's livable. I was only able to knock a 1/4" hole in it and I pounded pretty hard all over, but that whole area is dark nasty rusty and needs to go.

There were an additional four rusty areas on the passenger side. Two more on the hump, one I was able to knock a hole in that is about 1/2"x2" and one that made a pretty close to perfect 1/2" circle. One hole directly above the cross member about 1/2" in diameter, and one that is about 1/16" in diameter a little behind that. I couldn't see that hole until I got under the jeep and saw daylight, then I went back and and banged on it some more but didn't get very far.

Now that I know what it looks like on the underside I searched all over the body for any more areas like it but so far haven't found any. Basically, the undercoating will be cracked and feel a little like poking graham crackers.

The new ones on the hump are probably gonna need the transmission to be dropped to weld. Convenient since the cross member will need to come off to fix the other one, and it will give me an opportunity to replace the throwout bearing.

More convenient still, with the exception of the first hole I found, all the others are on flat surfaces.

Since I'm only worried at the moment about water getting in, and since all of these holes are in areas where I can patch with larger material, my plan of attack is:

Use tiger hair fiberglass filler to patch all the holes I made, and drop the hammer on a mig rig as soon as funds permit. That's gonna be about 2 or 3 months. Once I'm set, cut the rusty areas back to good metal, weld in new 1/8" or 3/16" material, fix whatever needs fixing while I'm there, put her back together and ride until the next thing comes up.

All this body work stuff is new to me, so I'd appreciate someone more experienced in this area signing off on that plan.

 

Pass on the fiberglass its gonna take longer to use not hold for too long and be a pain to remove later.If you want a patch to stay and not be a pain steel metal same gauge as the floor and use panel bonding adhesives its as strong as a weld and easy to use,Theres two styles ones a two part that uses a special gun.The other is a single tube and uses a standard caulking gun.When it comes to repair it right you can cut around the patch and weld in a real one if you like.Or they do sell the floor pans in pieces you replace the whole piece vs patching it when it times to weld it.And on the leaks check all your window and door gaskets and also the front windshield all can let water in for you.

 

Thanks for the input, Andrew. Do you have a particular panel bonding compound you recommend? I found some locally stocked at Oreilly's around here, but it's about $65 for one of the two-tube types. I think it should be plenty for the amount of repairing I need to do. Also, what's the shelf life on an opened set of that stuff?

 

Its been a while since i used it but i used 3m brand it was the two stage with the funny looking gun.It had a 90 min work time and 24 hours it was cured fully.Shelf life open i have no idea on i used all of mine up,But read the packaging on it or worse case email the maker and ask before you buy it.If you want to replace the floors later on i would use whatever the cheapest stuff they got is.If you want the patch forever i would use 3m brand.